1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a photographing control device and a photographing control method for use in a case where two or more types of subjects are photographed, as well as a program for causing a computer to carry out the photographing control method.
2. Description of the Related Art
Photographing apparatuses having functions to detect a face of a person from a photographed image and change conditions of image processing applied to the image or photographing conditions depending on the result of face detection have been proposed. In such photographing apparatuses, the face detection is achieved by detecting face candidate areas from the image, and carrying out matching between the face candidate areas and face patterns stored in a database. Further, a technique has been proposed, in which not only the face patterns but also patterns of various pets, such as dog, cat and bird, are stored in a database, and a pet specified by specifying the type of pet is detected (see Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication No. 2009-021862, which is hereinafter referred to as Patent Document 1).
When photographing is carried out, there are cases where not only one person but two or more persons are photographed. When two or more persons are at different distances from the photographing apparatus in the direction of optical axis and one of the persons is focused, image of the other person(s) is blurred. Therefore, a technique has been proposed, which involves dividing the image into two or more subject areas, detecting a main subject area from the subject areas, and controlling the focal position and the aperture of the optical system of the photographing apparatus so that all the detected main subject areas are focused (see Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication No. 11(1999)-038313, which is hereinafter referred to as Patent Document 2). Another technique has been proposed, which involves determining during photographing whether or not it is photographing of a person, and if the photographing of a person is carried out, setting a shallow depth of field with focusing the person to obtain an image like a portrait with a blurred background (see Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication No. 2001-215404, which is hereinafter referred to as Patent Document 3).
None of the above-mentioned Patent Documents, however, considers a case where two or more types of subjects, such as a person and a pet, are photographed, and it is difficult to appropriately photograph desired types of subjects.